Yesterday, we made a very rare trip away from Bristol, this time to Stratford Upon Avon, the birthplace of, in case you have been living in a cave all your life, Antony Worrall Thompson, the diminutive TV chef. Surprisingly, there appeared to be no local references to the town’s finest son, amid the branches of Subway and The Works, but perhaps we weren’t looking hard enough. Anyway, it was nice to be back in SOA, as no one calls it, for the first time since 1976. I’d like to think nothing had changed but, in all honesty, I remember almost nothing about it other than aspects no self-respecting blogger would write about.
The first decision was going to revolve around how to get there, my choice being by train. So, well in advance of the big day, I researched the cost of tickets. The absolute cheapest fare came in £120.20 for the pair of us. If we had updated our ‘two together’ railcard, it would have come in at a still absurdly expensive £80 and few pennies. My preferred tickets would have required two changes on the outward journey, including an entire station change in Birmingham and three on the return trip, that latter of which would take three and a quarter hours.
As an avid trainspotter, I have noted that most trains are running virtually empty these days, mainly because of the lingering effects of the coronavirus but also, quite possibly, because of the extortionate rail fares. I had laughingly suggested that we travel first class as a treat after enduring this awful lockdown but that would have cost a mere £356.60, travelling for most of the journey in carriages that have no first class provision. If the tickets had been £25 each, that would have been £50 the train companies would not otherwise have received, along with whatever light refreshments we consumed along the way, but clearly they’d rather go without passengers. So, we drove instead.
The drive to Stratford was a combination of gridlock and mere heavy traffic from beginning to near the end. My live traffic SatNav was constantly recalculating different routes and we ended up enjoying a criss-cross journey on the minor roads of the Cotswolds. It was pleasing but knackering. I could not but help thinking that cheaper train tickets might just persuade many people to abandon the car and fill the empty trains wizzing around the country but clearly forcing people onto the roads to add to our chronic pollution problem is a bigger government priority. I reckon driving to Stratford cost around a sixth of the cheapest available rail fare.
To cap it all, I didn’t clap eyes on the great bard Worrall Thompson, which was a great shame because I am sure he could have given me some useful cookery tips. It’s such a shame that no one else famous came from the town.
Anyway, my advice on getting from A to B is quite simple: if you want to let the train take the strain, be rich. If you aren’t rich, take the car. It might take forever and fill the air with countless carcinogens but at least you won’t need to take out a second mortgage.
